Days-per-move clocks
Choose 1, 3, 5, 7, or 15 days per move. The clock only ticks down on your turn, so you control the pace.
Correspondence chess
What is correspondence chess?
Correspondence chess is a form of chess where each player has hours, days, or even weeks to make a single move. Instead of racing a clock, you think deeply, study the position carefully, and play your best move whenever you're ready — just like the great masters did when chess was played by post.
Days
Per move, not minutes per game.
Many
Run several games at once.
Anywhere
Phone, laptop, on the go.
Anytime
Move when it suits you.
Why play correspondence chess
Chess that fits your life, not the other way around.
Live chess is a sprint. Correspondence chess is a marathon, a puzzle, and a study session all at once. You don't need to set aside an uninterrupted hour. You play one move on the morning train, another after dinner, another before bed. The board waits for you.
Because you have time, you can analyze deeply, calculate variations carefully, and try ideas you'd never risk in a five-minute blitz. It's how serious players sharpen their understanding — and it's how a lot of beautiful chess gets played.
Live chess vs. correspondence chess
Same game, very different experience.
| Live chess | Correspondence chess | |
|---|---|---|
| Time per move | Seconds to a few minutes. | Hours, days, sometimes longer. |
| Game length | Minutes from start to finish. | Days to weeks/months per game. |
| Pace | Sit down, focus, finish. | A move at a time, around your day. |
| Multiple games | One at a time. | Run dozens at once. |
| Style of thinking | Quick pattern recognition. | Deep calculation and study. |
| Best for | Quick fun, focused practice. | Deep improvement, busy schedules, real long-form chess. |
A short history
From the postal service to your pocket.
Correspondence chess is older than the chess clock. Players in different cities, and later in different countries, would write their moves on postcards and mail them to opponents. A single game could take a year or more. World championships were played this way long before the internet existed.
Online correspondence chess keeps the spirit of those games — deep, considered, played around the rest of life — but cuts the wait from weeks to seconds. Your move arrives the moment you make it, the board is always with you on your phone, and a single notification tells you when it's your turn.
On ChessHere
Correspondence chess, the way it should work.
Most platforms treat correspondence chess as an afterthought. We treat it like the heart of the game. Here's everything you get when you play a correspondence game on ChessHere.
Conditional moves
Plan ahead. Set "if my opponent plays X, I play Y" and we'll play it for you the moment the position arrives. Save days of waiting in forced lines.
Vacation mode
Going away? Sick? Pause every one of your games at once with a single tap. Your clocks stop until you come back.
Reminders that fit you
Email, web, or phone — pick how we let you know it's your turn. Never miss a move just because life got busy.
My-turn dashboard
Every active game at a glance. See whose turn it is, how much time is left, and what's about to time out.
Tournaments
Real tournaments at a correspondence pace. Standings, fair pairings, real winners — events that actually finish.
Separate rating
Your correspondence rating is tracked separately from your bullet, blitz, rapid, and classical ratings. Slow and fast skill aren't the same thing.
Phone-friendly
Our mobile app means your games are always with you. Move on the train, on a break, before bed.
Save your games
Download your finished games to study, share, or keep forever. Your chess history is yours.
Why correspondence makes you better
The thinking time you wish you had in your live games.
You actually calculate.
In a five-minute blitz you guess. With a day to think, you can play out variations five and ten moves deep, the way the position deserves.
You can learn between moves.
Time to look up an opening, study a similar middlegame, work through an endgame technique. Every game becomes a study session.
You play more games at once.
A handful of correspondence games running in parallel gives you more chess in less of your day than any single live session ever could.
No tilt, no time scrambles.
When you play badly in a flag, the next game still hangs over your head. In correspondence, every move gets your full attention, calmly.
Getting started
New to correspondence chess? Start here.
-
1
Start with three days per move.
It's the sweet spot — long enough to think carefully, short enough that games actually progress.
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2
Run two or three games at first.
Don't sign up for ten games at once until you know how it feels. Two or three running in parallel is plenty for your first month.
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3
Treat every move like it's the only move.
If you're going to spend three days, spend it. Look at the candidate moves, calculate forcing lines, check for tactics. The whole point is the depth.
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4
Use conditional moves in forced lines.
When you can already see two or three moves of a forcing sequence, set them as conditional moves. The game will play itself through the obvious part and bring the position back to you when there's a real choice.
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5
Set vacation before you travel.
Heading away for a week? Turn on vacation mode. Every game you have pauses at once. Come back, turn it off, the games resume from exactly where they were.
Perguntas frequentes
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O que é xadrez por correspondência?
Xadrez por correspondência é um formato onde cada jogador tem dias — não minutos — para fazer cada lance. É a mesma ideia que outras plataformas chamam de "xadrez diário". Os jogadores usam-no para pensar profundamente sobre as posições, jogar em diferentes fusos horários e encaixar o xadrez no resto das suas vidas. O ChessHere suporta controles de tempo de um a catorze dias por lance.
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Quanto tempo dura uma partida de xadrez por correspondência?
Uma partida típica dura de duas a quatro semanas, com três dias por lance. Controles de tempo mais rápidos (um dia por lance) podem terminar em uma semana, e os mais lentos (cinco ou sete dias) podem durar um mês ou mais. Na prática, a maioria dos jogadores faz vários lances por dia, então as partidas geralmente terminam bem antes que o controle de tempo os force a isso.
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Posso jogar muitas partidas de xadrez por correspondência ao mesmo tempo?
Sim — a maioria dos jogadores sérios de xadrez por correspondência joga entre cinco e vinte partidas ao mesmo tempo. O painel Minhas Partidas organiza as partidas ativas pela vez de quem é jogar, então você sempre vê os tabuleiros esperando pelo seu lance primeiro. Não há limite por conta para partidas simultâneas de xadrez por correspondência no nível gratuito.
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O que são lances condicionais?
Lances condicionais permitem que você enfileire respostas aos prováveis próximos lances do seu oponente, e o ChessHere os joga automaticamente. Defina "se eles jogarem X, eu jogo Y" no tabuleiro da partida e o lance é executado no momento em que seu oponente joga o gatilho. Isso é particularmente útil em linhas de abertura profundas onde os próximos vários lances são forçados — você não precisa estar online para jogá-los.
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O que é o modo de férias?
O modo de férias pausa o relógio em todas as partidas de xadrez por correspondência que você está jogando, com um único interruptor. Use-o para viagens, doenças ou qualquer período em que você não possa jogar. O nível gratuito inclui um orçamento anual de férias que é suficiente para viagens normais; o uso é rastreado por conta para que não possa ser explorado para atrasar partidas indefinidamente.
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O que acontece se eu ficar sem tempo para um lance?
Se o seu relógio de tempo por lance chegar a zero, você perde a partida por tempo. O oponente não precisa reivindicá-lo manualmente — o ChessHere encerra a partida automaticamente. O modo de férias pausa o seu relógio se você o ativar antes do prazo. Tempos esgotados repetidos em muitas partidas podem sinalizar sua conta para o sistema de emparelhamento automático, que o desprioriza de novos emparelhamentos de xadrez por correspondência.
Try correspondence chess.
Free account, ten seconds to set up. Start a game at three days per move and see why so many players never go back to anything else.